Dear Quality people,
Platt raises excellent questions, but in my opinion,
questionable responses. There is a current on this
site of extremists who believe in the "authority of
MOQ." The MOQ feels right, tastes right, and so if
only the world would realign on MOQ everything would
be ok. I quote Platt:
> Now in the MOQ I
> find what I consider to be a rational authority for
> my stance.
This stance is a "transference" problem: Platt is
transferring his problems to an external source to
solve his problems. It's a common technique in this
world today (see Scientology: Soul Hackers on Google
Groups search). In a world without God we think up a
number of authority figures to replace him (Platt
himself noted this). I call attention to this because
I believe that Pirsig does not believe in
"transference" to the almighty MOQ. Sam has shown in
LILA how reluctant Pirsig was in pursuing MOQ.
So what does Pirsig say in my opinion? He gets a lot
of things right. A morality will be man centered, and
not nature centered or "authority" centered. A
morality will be an activism, not passive. Man will
have to create his own morality. It will be
value-centered, using FACTS as guides to our values
(thus Q-intellect is SUPREMELY important). It will
include LIBERTY, the option to be degenerate. It will
include PROGRESS, the need to create social change. It
will include IDEALS, people like LILA who embody his
IDEAL-TYPE: she has no external authority other than
herself, and in and of that, she is a moral figure.
It's clear that a metaphysics is insufficient. As
Becker in Structure of Evil says (and what I wrote
above is based on his survey of ALL of sociology up to
Pirsig in fact) we need to rediscover Auguste Comte.
He notes 3 stages: theology (god is dead), metaphysics
(Victorian ism), positivism (Dynamic meaning). We have
been through the first 2 and are now on the doorstep
on positivism. I think ZAMM and LILA are both calls
for a positivist morality. A morality that is created
by man through love and actively implemented in the
world today. Reverting to a metaphysics is a failure,
a regression to Victorian morality. It does not work.
And anyone trying to defend the MOQ as Pirsig's main
line has not read LILA. The MOQ is a "wahfer thin
mint" that if you eat it will make you sick again,
Victorian style (time to hitch up your corsets).
Angus
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